It was a couple of years ago when Nielsen decided to take into account social conversations on Twitter, to measure TV ratings. On Thursday, the consumer and audience insights company announced that it will also be adding Facebook metrics to its ratings calculations.

According to the announcement, Nielsen will now include posts shared with friends and family, with followers, and publicly. More specifically, the company will calculate how social media authorship, engagement, reach and demographics contribute to the overall ratings of TV shows. The measurements will be conducted 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

To facilitate the measurements, Facebookwill provide sanitised data to Nielsen. In other words, the social network will provide anonymous aggregate program-related data, without compromising its users privacy and compliance with anonymity regulations. The new metrics are expected to roll out during the first half of 2016 in four key markets, where Nielsen TV Twitter analytics are already available: Australia, Italy, Mexico and U.S.

The usage of social as second screen is highly valuable in the TV market. Both Twitter and Facebook dominate this, with viewers browsing social media while watching their favourite shows. According to Facebook, 85% of people who reported visiting a social network while watching TV, said they visited Facebook. This just proves why social media metrics and their usage cannot be ignored when measuring TV viewership.

During the past couple of years we have all been accustomed to seeing CTAs on our TV screens, prompting us to submit comments, and to post about a certain TV show. Concentration around specific hashtags acts as a clear indicator of the success or failure of a TV programme.

Back in October 2015, Facebook launched a voting and polling feature that helps broadcasters get information from viewers very fast. The company also launched a photo and video Submission app at the same time that helps viewers engage directly with programming, allowing broadcasters to showcase what people have to say in-app or on their microsites.

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Villy is a Digital Strategist. Villy studied Computers, Networks and Communications Engineering. She defines herself as an infinite pool of useless information, varying from astrophysics and biogenetics to modern art and football tactics.